Soaked SouthCoast could mean major mosquito menace

It's summer on SouthCoast and that means everyone is buzzing about ... mosquitoes.

JESSICA TROLAND

It's summer on SouthCoast and that means everyone is buzzing about ... mosquitoes.

"With all this rain, we're expecting a busy season," said Jennifer Dacey, superintendent of the Bristol County Mosquito Control Project.

"The more water we have, the more breeding spots there are for certain species to lay their eggs," Dacey said.

With double-digit rainfall totals for the month of June (the average is about 3 to 4 inches), there are plenty of puddles and other standing water throughout the region.

Officials at both the Bristol and Plymouth County Mosquito Control Projects said they have already begun to take precautions to reduce the mosquito population. They've been spraying larvicide on retention ponds and swamp areas where mosquitoes love to breed.

The projects use BTI, a type of low-impact bacteria that is specific to mosquitoes and black flies, killing them in their larval stages; it is not harmful to humans, officials said.

Anthony Texeira, superintendent of the Plymouth County project, said crews have also been spraying for adult mosquitoes.

So far, monitoring has not shown a significantly high number of adult mosquitoes but Texeira said they have found lots of larvae.

He added that excessive amounts of flood water are reviving old, unhatched eggs from past summers. Both he and Dacey said they expect a large hatch to take place either this week or next.

With more than 50 species of mosquitoes in Massachusetts, any source of water can be used as a breeding ground.

Mosquitoes that carry the potentially deadly Eastern Equine Encephalitis (EEE) virus breed in cedar swamps, while the mosquitoes that transmit the West Nile virus typically breed in catch basins and stagnant water.

On Friday, state public health officials said the West Nile virus had been found in a mosquito sample collected June 25 in Whitman, the first in the commonwealth this year.

In recent years, SouthCoast has seen increased frequency of the EEE virus and that has them worried this year.

In a video conference earlier this week, Dr. Catherine Brown, state public health veterinarian, said the preliminary data the state has on this year's crop of mosquitoes shows higher levels of the breeds most likely to transmit disease.

"Given the intensity of what we saw last year, we're certainly particularly worried about triple-E," Brown said, adding that West Nile Virus is less dependent on what happened the year before.

Typically, the first findings of EEE come in bird-biting mosquitoes. "When we find that a mosquito species that bites both mammals and birds has become infected, that's when we start to worry," said Texeira.

Eastern Equine Encephalitis usually surfaces in late July or early August and remains a threat until the first hard frost. Last year, a number of SouthCoast communities and schools curtailed outdoor activities in the late summer and early fall, after EEE-carrying mosquitoes were identified.

Dacey and Texeira recommend the following to reduce the mosquito threat:

Get rid of standing water wherever it is — in bird baths, clogged gutters, small pools of water collected in tarps. Drilling small holes in the bottom of trash cans can prevent water buildup there.

If you're outside from dusk to dawn, wear long sleeves and pants to cover up as much as possible.

Use insect repellents; for an organic option, Dacey recommends using oil of lemon eucalyptus.

The Bristol County Mosquito Control Project and the Plymouth County Mosquito Control Project are now taking spray requests. For more information, visit their websites at http://www.bristolcountymosquitocontrol.com/ and http://www.plymouthmosquito.com/.